[MUSIC] Hi, welcome to the first lesson on the Week 7. This week is a pretty much stuff. And we are presenting the application of this Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism 2.0. We call it because it's the evolution of our first type of accounting method and that is based on process. So then let's start in the session one, introducing basic concepts of relational analysis. Then we will look at the concept of processor more in detail. And then present the tool-kit that can be used to put together all the different check in terms of feasibility, viability, desirability. Okay, so in these ten minutes, we will illustrate three things. The rationale provided by relational analysis. So a logical way of structure analysis of social-ecological system by individuating, first, functional element. And then specify how this functional element can be described in terms of structural element. And the second part will be about the use of the 4 causal relations introduced by Aristotle. It sounds strange in high technological world to get back to Aristotle. But it's very useful for giving a logical procedural way of analyzing complex self-organizing system. And then we will end with a definition of social-ecological system that is useful to study the NEXUS. So what is the logic to start the analysis of social-ecological system? When you go to a social-ecological system, what is it we are looking at? So let's start with the definition of a system. A system is a set of functional and structural components that are linked by some form of interaction and interdependence. Operating within a prescribed boundary to achieve a common final goal. I am using a definition given by FAO by adding some elements here and there. So, in this case, the final goal of the system, what we will call using Aristotle, the final cause is the emergent property of the system. It is why you are looking at the different element as a coherent system. It's what makes the whole more than the sum of its part. So why we want to get into this esoteric way of defining things? Because, finally, you have a way of defining what a society is, what a village is. Because, otherwise, if you go by using an economic explanation, a village would be something generally under value. Or it is difficult to provide a satisfying answer to what is a village. So using the logic of the metabolic analysis, a village is a system that has a final cause to reproduce and maintain its identity, while learning how to become more adaptable. In a sense, a village has an identity, but in 30 years, it will not be the same as it's now. As what remain the same is the process that is its study is path dependent trajectory. And is learning on how to maintain its identity. But while becoming something else. So how can we then analyze a village? We can, for instance, look at a village and say, within this village, we will have different functional compartment. And then one logic could be less imaged that we are looking human activity or acts of that. And then basically we will have different compartment of this village. One is for producing humans, that is why-how things. Another would be to produce food, subsistence. Then we will have another to produce energy, producing charcoal in this case. And then you will have another functional element that are related. It would be to generate disposable cash, to make some income to be economically active. To be able to buy things, to interact with the rest of the society. And in this case, l divided these in two functional component. One does this by using land. They're going to through a production by producing cash crops. And one is by working off-farm. So this component require land. This component doesn't require land, but require someone providing a job. Then we can go after this, what are the structural element they are using to these function elements? So you must have a house in which you could have personal care, then preparation of meals. Then leisure, so all these could be seen as activities that require structural components. For producing food, you must have a crop land and tools for doing these. And for producing charcoal, the same. So you could mix two different way of producing charcoal. And you could have different types of having cash crops. Rice, irrigated and rainfed, vegetable production. You could have different types of jobs. Once we have this type of logical, the grammar of the village, then we can start getting into describing the functional elements as process. We'll see in the next session more to attain the logical processor. More or less, you know on the previous class as we saw, you have energy, food, water entering here as input. Labor, technology, land here as fund. You have flows coming from nature and pollution going. And as a result, the old system is capable of reproducing its own identity. Then this village is the sum of these flows. The village is described as the sum of the flows required to do the different functional elements that are required to express their identity. So you will have a household residential, subsistence, cash crops, off-farm jobs, charcoal. All these functional elements can be aggregated in the description on the village. Then if we get one particular element, the cash crop functional element, then we can have that the functional element cash crops can be divided, in the case of cash crops, in two typology, vegetable and rice. And then you can have that the rice, in turn, can be subdivided into other processor. The rice production, rainfed and with irrigation. So when we have this logic for organize and saying what a village is and to have quantitative representation, then we can start using a little bit of this work. You remember, in fact, to say, okay, given the administrative boundary from the socioeconomic dimension, how many people you are there? How much more you can do? So what is the time in working?. And then you can go on the bottom line in terms of geographic boundary. How much land is total habitable land? What is managed, what is not managed? Then from there, you go how much work is off-land and on-land? Then the off-land work could be in economic activity going inside the village or outside the village. Then you have households, structural types. And then you have all the activity on-land, rice, vegetables, subsistence, charcoal. Then when you have this analysis that is using basically all the time and all the managed land that you have under control. You can aggregate this in how much money is produced. How much items, commodities are important? What are the relation with the [INAUDIBLE] systems? So this is just to give you an idea how the logic in which we can start organizing our continued information using the logic of the relational analysis instead. Coming to the 4 Aristotelaan Causal Relation, we can see that there are the standard 4, I think, that everybody knows or you should know. You should get studied at school. You have your statue. And material cause of the statue is the marble, the material which the statue is made. The formal cause is the shape of the statue. There is a blueprint or something that in the mind of the sculptor the shape of what you see. Then there's an efficient cause. Someone has made the statue. Otherwise we would not have it there. And finally, there is a final cause. So either the sculptor wanted to have money for the statue. Someone paid for it or people like looking at statues. I mean, there are possible final cause to have the statue. So why is this important? Because the fourth final cause are essential in metabolic analysis. A simple example in biochemistry metabolic analysis within an enzyme. So you have a substrate that became a metabolic product. So you have a material cause that became the final cause, why you have the metabolic process. Then you have an enzyme, which is the formal cause, that make possible to have the process to move the substrate into the final cause metabolic product. All these is a relevant process. And why it is important is because you cannot have a if you don't have x. And you cannot have a as well if you don't have an enzyme that knows how to do x in a. And you must have a process. And in order to have a process, these things must happen in the right place. So there is a lot of relational analysis when you have the capability of establishing the double process. So you have a what, what is that is you're doing and we're doing what. Why you are doing what you are doing. And how you are doing. So these are, in this way, by using these 4 cause, you can answer the three important question, what, how and why. So every time you have a relevant process to be reproduced, that is, putting rice, fed or producing charcoal or a cash crop stabilization. You must have a substrate, an organized structure capable of doing. So the know how a process that actually is doing it. And an admissible environment that is not possible to have this relevant process in the first place. So let's go through what we already saw. An organization of social-ecological problem using the 4 Aristotelean causes. Then you must have an admissible environment. So you must have internal flows and funds providing the required inputs. And external flows and fund making possible the process. So these has to do with feasibility when you are talking about an admissible environment. Then you must have an efficient cause that is capable of achieving the expected result. So these are process under human control. This is about viability. And then, in order to be viable, be capable of doing the right process in the right moment, you have to know how to do this. So this is where you have the right mix of structural elements and how to use it. Then, finally, you have to have a process in the society that can tell you what we want to do. Otherwise, it will not be desirable. So again, you can see that the whole process of organization of social-ecological system is about putting in check the what, the how, and the why. So the last point is that, how can we define the metabolic pattern of a social-ecological system using relational analysis? A social-ecological system is an adaptive, self-reproducing and self-maintaining system. So it's made of what? It's made of social structure. They are compartment made of fund element, people, technology, land uses, that are capable of metabolizing specific mixes of input and output inside the technosphere. The second, there are ecological structural compartment made up of fund elements, soil, aquifer, marine ecosystems, terrestrial ecosystems, atmosphere. They are metabolizing specific mix of input and output in the biosphere. Then there are stock element that are accumulated quantity of natural resources. It would be the oil or the coal reserve. It can be used in non-renewable way, either by consuming the stocks or by filling the sinks. In addition to that, a social-ecological system is an open system that can interact with other social-ecological system through trade. And in this way, can change the profile of allocation of fund and flows in its internal functional compartment. In this way, we can escape the original definition of constraints. You remember [INAUDIBLE] that now, in developed countries, all [INAUDIBLE] just make that to import. And they don't care whether or not what they do is the same or not. So I will try to include within our review, which is pretty messy. But I hope this time, you are in the seventh week, you should be able to handle it. So let's look, this is the technosphere. And you have that the different elements inside the society are made of people exosomatic activity. Then technology exosomatic activity, and managed land uses. So then these societal fund are used to control internal flows in relation to different functional compartment. Building and manufacturing, energy and mining, water sector, agriculture other services, household. And then these flows are going through functional element made of all the mix of these three fund elements. Then all of this interaction is capable of maintaining, reproducing and making adaptable the identity of the society through the turnover of institutions. In order to be able to have these in the technosphere, you need, in the biosphere, activities of ecological fund. They are providing services, inputs and absorbing waste. And natural resources, especially at the moment, we're relying heavily on stocks, non-renewable natural resources like oil. And then another thing is that there is a degree of openness that social-ecological system can get a break when they have some limits exporting oil brought in. And transferring, externalizing to other social-ecological system the requirement or input, either fund or flows that they cannot access. So hope that at this point in time, you can understand better, easy way of conceptualization of the metabolic part of the social-ecological system.
